


If you so asked, I'd tell you all my secrets in the dark.

by carefulfleshgnawer



Category: Ao no Exorcist | Blue Exorcist
Genre: Comfort/Angst, Gen, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-08
Updated: 2021-02-08
Packaged: 2021-03-14 09:41:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,422
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29293818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carefulfleshgnawer/pseuds/carefulfleshgnawer
Summary: Renzou is too caught up in his thoughts to fall asleep, and Konekomaru takes pity on him.
Relationships: Miwa Konekomaru & Shima Renzou
Comments: 8
Kudos: 13





	If you so asked, I'd tell you all my secrets in the dark.

**Author's Note:**

> Not rlly proofread or edited I was just feeling touch starved and wanted to write something like cuddles...

Renzou can’t sleep. He keeps tossing and turning. He doesn’t feel right. Hasn’t felt right since Homare bid him to go back to true cross.

It’s been a few days and the other exwires have mostly calmed down – the first day had been the harshest, and the ones that followed were in turn more and more mellow.

They haven’t welcomed him back, but they are accepting his presence begrudgingly. That counts for something, right?

So… why won’t his heart settle down? The damn thing feels like a rock that’s choking him.

He doesn’t feel like this in the day.

When the sun is out, he’s Shima Renzou, the spy that _can_ and _will_ again. Charming, smarmy, slippery. Above it all – secretive. In the daytime, Renzou enjoys this – all of it. The lies, the way that time is running out, the things he’s privy to that others aren’t, all the turning cogs and loosening bolts.

In the daytime, he loves his life.

But then… when the sun falls below the horizon and he’s lying awake for the fourth night in a row, mind racing too fast for him to follow the flow of his own thoughts-

He wants to tell them everything. He wants to spill the secrets, wants to come clean. It all sits ill in his mind and heavy in his chest, like a bomb waiting to go off. Renzou wants to explain it all – how he got to where he is, and where he’s planning to go.

Renzou wants them to _forgive him_ and take him back. He wants their trust, their confidence.

He wants to go back to how it was before everything - before he grew tainted with the bitter poison of contempt and frustration. Wants to go back to childhood before he started training, when he still had some semblance of hope for a nicer life, something he could pick out and shape for himself freely and without worry…

Renzou thinks that if Bon were to rush into the dorm room right now and ask that cursed question ‘ _Why?_ ’… well, then Renzou wouldn’t have it in him to wave it off so nonchalantly. He would fall at Bon’s feet and plead for forgiveness and write out the sins he’s committed in blood for all to see.

But Bon won’t come rushing in. And Konekomaru – another person who could get the truth out of him right now – won’t come and ask him either. There’s an ever-present chill to the academy that wasn’t there not too long ago. The shoulders of his childhood friends remain cold and unapproachable… and that’s fine, Renzou surmises. He’s done everything to deserve this.

The moonlight is ghostly pale where it comes in through the gap in the curtains. Faintly, Renzou makes out the noises of the night – distant voices, car engines, dogs barking.

A weary glance at the clock on his phone tells him it’s three in the morning. He’s been lying here trapped in his thoughts for the better part of three hours.

Thinking like this usually tires him out something wicked. Knocks him right out. And yet, this time he _still_ can’t sleep.

“Damn it,” he whispers, barely louder than a breath. Turns again on his bed, to face the wall. Maybe if he settles in comfortably enough (he won’t), sleep will finally take him (unlikely).

He’s frustrated with himself a little, Renzou admits. Unbidden, a memory of the time he’d agreed to become Mephisto’s spy floats up… Yaozou’s voice desperate and dismayed ‘ _Renzou is just a kid… He can’t be a spy, it’s too much for him-_ ’

It’s times like these – only times like these -, that Renzou finds himself agreeing. In the dark and quiet of the night, chasing himself in endless circles, exhausted but far too awake and keyed up – he can feel that he’s bitten off far more than he can chew, and his jaw is aching from his own hubris.

Renzou turns yet again, frowning deeply. This night is crueller than the others. At the rate his thoughts are going, soon enough they’ll round up on-

“…mm.. Shima?” Konekomaru’s sleepy voice floats over from the other side of the room, ruining that train of thought.

Renzou stills, all but holding his breath.

“You keep moving…” Konekomaru continues, his voice soft, “are you awake?”

Konekomaru hasn’t been talking to him since Renzou came back. He’s not ignoring Renzou _altogether_ , but the flavour of avoidance is rather strong. And he doesn’t laugh at Renzou’s jokes the way he used to, or share candy the way he used to…

Caught so unaware, Renzou isn’t sure what to do now that Konekomaru is… initiating something akin to conversation.

“I’m awake,” he answers in a whisper. He… isn’t sure why he’s so nervous suddenly, but his heart thuds heavily in his chest, and there’s a rushing noise in his ears.

“Is something wrong?”

_What a loaded question._

Renzou bites back the first three responses that come to his mind – all of them jokes or a play-down of what’s going on in his head. Things he can’t say - not right now and maybe not ever. “No, everything is fine.”

There’s quiet. And the quiet stretches on. Renzou can’t see Konekomaru, and the other boy can’t see him. Both their beds are bathed in darkness that the strip of moonlight doesn’t pierce through.

After a moment too long, Renzou’s heart begins to calm and he assumes that Konekomaru’s gone back to sleep, but then-

The bed creaks, and the sound is followed by the unmistakable sound of feet shuffling over the floor. Konekomaru’s rumpled form comes into view, bleached out in the blue light. He’s dragging his blanket behind him, his pillow tucked under an arm.

“Move over, Shima,” he says quietly, but with a strange kind of resolve.

“What? Why? I told you – everything’s fine,” Renzou says, his whisper turning a bit harsh.

He stares at Konekomaru standing right next to his bed, and the pace of his heartbeat is rocketed sky-high again. Konekomaru’s head is turned as if he’s looking at Renzou, but he knows that the other’s eyesight isn’t good enough to make out his expression in the dark. Renzou isn’t fully aware of what kind of face he’s making either, to be honest.

“I had a bad dream,” Konekomaru states simply. It’s such an _obvious_ lie, and they both know it.

Renzou has half a mind to send the boy back to his bed with a few scathing words-

But he doesn’t. Instead, he shuffles sideways, pressing himself against the wall to make room.

“Well then, come on,” Renzou whispers, defeated. (Elated?)

Konekomaru lies down next to him. They’re both a bit squished, but… just knowing that someone is next to him calms Renzou down. The thoughts that had been bothering him sit quietly in an untouched corned of his mind.

“You don’t have to talk about it,” Konekomaru says, “and you’re probably not even allowed to. But I know you have a lot of stuff going on, Shima…”

Renzou swallows, not knowing what to say to that.

“But I want you to know that I trust you. Maybe it’s foolish, maybe it’s naïve... but I like to think I know just enough about you to know that you’re not a bad person. Not all the way through. And I hope that one day you… come back to us on your own terms. No more lies or secrets.”

Renzou feels a knot in his throat. The words – they’re on his tongue in all their bitter glory – and he wants nothing more than to spit them out.

He wants to tell the boy _everything_.

“Koneko-”

“Anyways, goodnight, Shima,” Konekomaru says, turning so that his back faces Renzou.

Renzou closes his mouth quietly. The truth that had sat on his tongue just a second ago runs away and hides in his heels. “Goodnight,” he whispers back, sounding like he intended to say something else and something more.

Without thinking, Renzou throws his hand over Konekomaru’s side and shuffles in closer so that his forehead rests at the back of the boy’s neck. Konekomaru stiffens at first, but then relaxes, bringing up a hand to wrap loosely around Renzou’s wrist.

A quiet understanding between the two of them. Something simpler than words – words are nothing but trouble these days.

“I’m sorry about this whole mess,” Renzou murmurs, barely loud enough to be heard.

“You can make it up to us one day,” Konekomaru answers, just the slightest bit louder, “Now get some sleep, Shima.”


End file.
